In preparation for the BYD Q4 earnings release tomorrow, we’ve put together the pertinent forward looking commentary from BYD’s Q3 earnings call.
YOUTUBE
- “We’re pleased to report that the positive trends we’ve experienced in the third quarter are continuing into October. Given these trends, we expect our fourth-quarter comparisons will be the best of the year.”
- “So beyond the broader economic recovery, it appears as though Las Vegas is finally beginning its own recovery.”
- “Improvements in our Las Vegas Locals business is more about increased spend per visit than it is about increased visitation, and increases in spend per visit, or consumer spending, is more about consumer confidence than it is about job growth or housing statistics.”
- “We firmly believe that increases in consumer confidence can and will have an impact on our business long before the metrics in the housing and employment show significant improvement.”
- [LV Locals] “These trends are improving, and we have started the fourth quarter on a strong note by posting positive comparisons so far in the month of October—[both EBITDA and revenues]
- “We’re comparing it to October of 2009, so obviously, higher revenue will be generated by higher spend per visit. I don’t know that we’re creating a lot of new customers today, but we certainly have seen customers come back that have been sitting on the sidelines given their own personal economic conditions; so there’s certainly benefit from the lower tier and unrateds as well.”
- “We expect the fourth quarter interest expense for Borgata, including debt amortization fees associated with the new financing, to be approximately $22 million.”
- “Our effective tax rate for the quarter was 30%. This rate is lower than last year due to the consolidation of Borgata into our results. We expect the tax rate to be approximately the same for the fourth quarter of this year.”
- [Capex spending] “I would say that the numbers that we had for 2010 are probably good ones to use for 2011”
- [Revel competition] “Look, in the Atlantic City marketplace right now, there is plenty of capacity and so that any additional capacity will just create additional competition that I think is not needed. So we’d certainly like to see the competitive landscape kind of stay as is and not see additional capacity added to the marketplace.”
- [Borgata] “We haven’t changed our credit policies. We’ve been always very disciplined around that. We haven’t changed anything really in terms of how – other than our kind of our own normal business practices in terms of promoting. I think the market itself in Atlantic City has gotten more promotional around some of the credit policies and some of the play, but Borgata has largely not participated in that. [Room remodel] probably will occur sometime during calendar ‘11.
- “When we get into the fourth quarter and then the first quarter, the first being the highest volume quarter of a calendar year, I think you’ll see improvements. As far as direction on marketing, I would say that we’re obviously not going to sit back and ignore what’s going on in the town. I think we want to pay strong attention to and continue to establish customer loyalty that we have, and you’ll see us be as aggressive as we need to be to compete in a very competitive market.”
- Q: When Pinnacle opens up their site in Baton Rouge, is there a sense of how many customers are coming from that region that you think you would be competing against Pinnacle with?
- A: Next to none.
- “I think relative to labor [no increase in expenses], you’re absolutely correct. I mean, obviously, it will impact nominally marketing expense, because as people play more, they earn more, as our programs go. But we are very focused on flow through to the EBITDA line as we see spend-per visit move up.”
